After meeting on a year long Sustainability and Permaculture course in Bristol, Matt and Emm bought a 26acre hillside field near Wellington. Having never had their hands in soil (prior to the permaculture course), and with eclectic backgrounds ranging from Hospitality and small business, tech, driving instructor and Chinese medicine, they decided to radically change their lives and embark on setting up a mixed organic smallholding. The aim; to reconnect with the land, their food and find community and resilience.

Massively inspire by the course they had just finished, they threw themselves in at the deep end. In the first year they planted 2,000 native woodland trees plus 800 trees for coppicing, an orchard of 140 trees, built Polytunnels and set up a micro-scale market garden supplying local businesses and friends.

The basic principles of permaculture relate to; Earth care, People care and fair share. With this ethos strongly resonating, Matt and Emm laid a foundation for all the projects carried out on the small holding. They work by hand where possible, building, growing, tree planting, coppicing and only when larger machinery is necessary, do they employ local contractors for help.

They were very keen to share the way of life and inspire, educate, and, be educated and inspired by others. Volunteers come from all over the world to help on the holding and learn more about the off-grid Organic lifestyle. Some have gone away and also radically changed their lives, become small-holders, market gardeners and natural builders.

They continue to live a lower impact lifestyle in the straw-bale farmhouse they built. The farm is completely off-grid and a lot of the energy used comes from solar panels and wood from the farm.